The present invention relates to a regulated redundant modular power supply, and more particularly to a redundant modular power supply having an apparatus for testing the output of the modules, including the redundant module. The power supply also includes indicators for indicating a fault in any one of the power supply modules, including the redundant module.
Power supplies are known having redundancy such that if a failure occurs in the power supply, automatic switching occurs to a redundant portion of the power supply for ensuring continuous regulated output of the power supply. One such power supply is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,177,389, issued Dec. 4, 1979, to Heinrich Schott. The Schott apparatus includes a power supply system having two regulated power supply devices with outputs connected in parallel for redundant half-load operation. Transfer switch and discriminator means are provided to transfer the load from one power supply device to the other in the event of a failure of one of the power supply devices operating in a voltage regulation mode.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,912,940, issued Oct. 14, 1975, to John Vince, discloses a redundant power supply apparatus having output indicators connected to the output terminals of each power supply portion to indicate the functional condition of each portion of the redundant power supply.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,748,500, issued July 24, 1973, to Ford Tam, discloses a multiple redundant power supply for supplying a constant voltage at output terminals from separate voltage sources. If one of the voltage sources fails, means are provided to automatically transfer the load to a second voltage source. A manual switch means is provided for manually switching to the alternate voltage source to test its operability.